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Mental Health Bill [HL]

The noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, in one of her fascinating contributions—she opens a world to me of which I know nothing—reminded us of how psychiatry was used in Russia, Germany and so on in comparatively recent history and she added that this was done in many cases with the best will in the world of the psychiatrists who thought they were doing the right thing. When the Government think about this—if they do, and I hope they will, or if they do not, we will make them think about it—will they consider what would happen if a group of recently arrived immigrants was sitting in the Gallery, immigrants from central Europe, from Russia, from Germany, and they heard the Minister say there was no need to put in a Bill like this the fact that you could not be shut up as a case of mental illness because of your cultural, religious or political views? Those people, I believe, would be astonished. They are citizens of this country. It is going to apply to them. Surely the Government have got to think of their point of view. Will the Minister remember that?